Fuse: Insomniac’s Ted Price explains cover change

Fuse developer Insomniac Games opted to change the game’s art-style and cover last year, and CEO Ted Price has explained why the game’s new box art cuts everyone’s heads off, while discussing some broader issues at hand.

Speaking with OPM, Price said, “Covers are tough. They’re always difficult and we’ve been through the wringer over covers for years and years trying to figure out what best represents the game. It’s rare that everybody’s truly satisfied with the cover either internally and externally, so we make the best decisions we can.

“For us on Fuse it was about showing that Fuse, this alien substance, is a central part of the game which we hadn’t shown before. And we were also prepared for a lot of feedback on the cover. It has drawn attention and people asked a lot of questions about it: Why’d you cut of their heads? What’s the reasoning behind that?

“Well, part of the reasoning is when you have four characters and you want to present them on the front of a cover, we found the default positions for them were Charlie’s Angles-type poses, where it looks contrived and almost silly. And we were trying to avoid that.”

On the challenge of sending out the right message with game covers, Price added, “It’s really difficult to get it right because you don’t know. You’re putting yourself out there, putting our creations out and asking people to comment on it. And if the comments come back negative then we need to act on it, and if they come back positive then we need to figure out whether or not those comments were based purely on aesthetics or on something else.

“But the most important aspect is to make sure that at the core of the game is fun. And that isn’t about putting out trailers. That isn’t about putting box covers about, but actually taking the game and getting it in people’s hands, watching them play and asking them questions about what they liked and what they didn’t like.”

What do you make of Fuse so far, and its cover? Does the art matter, or does the game do all the talking? Let us know below.

Fuse hits PS3 and Xbox 360 on May 28 across North America, and across Europe May 31.